The subject matter described herein relates to a shirt or garment which covers the torso of a wearer. Specifically, embodiments are directed to a support shirt providing support along the chest and shoulder regions of a wearer. The support shirt can be used for a variety of sporting or work activities where support of the chest and shoulders is desired. One such application is a bench press shirt for support in weightlifting activities. Other applications include jobs involving lifting, pushing, or pulling heavy objects.
Bench press shirts provide an increase in the amount of weight a bench presser can lift as well as increased safety to the bench presser. Typically, bench press shirts are made of taut, relatively inelastic materials having high tensile strength, such as double knit polyester, canvas or denim. As distinguished from “compression shirts” which are fabricated of elastic, stretchable fabrics, bench press shirts fit tightly over the wearer, but do not stretch. The tightness of bench press shirts in general, and the tautness and relative inelasticity of the fabric, makes it difficult and time consuming to don a bench press shirt as compared to a tight T-shirt or compression shirt. In some instances, bench press shirts require assistance from another person to pull, push and pinch the fabric of the shirt into position onto the torso and arms of the wearer. There is a trade-off between the need for tautness, a tight fit, and tensile strength in the shirt to increase support for lifting versus the increased difficulty of donning such a shirt.
While bench press shirts have been designed in the past to provide support for the wearer, such shirts have suffered from one or more deficiencies. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 5,383,235 describes a zippered shirt which may be made of stretchable material in which the circumference of the area across the upper torso is less than that of the waist and lower portion of the shirt. Other weightlifting shirt designs focus on the type of material and configuration of the fabrics used across the upper chest. Such designs employ fabric or material across the shirt which fails to reinforce the shoulder and chest of a wearer during the bench press exercise. A deficiency in all previous designs has been the problem of easing ingress and egress from the bench press shirt, while still providing the fabric with the tautness and tensile strength needed for support.
Therefore, a need exists for an adjustable support shirt which provides for easier ingress and egress, reducing the effort required to put on and take off the shirt, while still providing the necessary shoulder and chest support during weightlifting or other work-related lifting activities.